Kenya in the Somali crossfire – ISN
May 20th, 2008
Somalia map (BBC)
The assassination of a Somali al-Qaida affiliate overshadows peace talks, with Kenya vulnerable to terrorist attacks in response.
By Daniel Ooko and Simon Roughneen in Nairobi
As Somalia engages in another round of peace talks, the security and humanitarian situation in the country deteriorates. Some 2.5 million of the country’s estimated eight million people now need humanitarian assistance, according to the UN – a 40 percent increase in 2008 alone. Hundreds of thousands are displaced, including 250,000 in what is thought to be the world’s largest refugee/IDP camp outside Mogadishu.
Yet another round of peace talks held in Djibouti last week ended without a face-to-face meeting between the US/Ethiopian-backed Transitional Federal Government (TFG), and the opposition Alliance for the Re-Liberation of Somalia, which encompasses many of the Islamic Courts Union (ICU) routed by the invading Ethiopian army in late 2006.
All told, there seems to be scant hope for a viable political settlement in a country that has lacked effective government since 1991.
Since taking office in November, Somali TFG Prime Minister Nur Hussein has engaged Somalia’s Islamist opposition, unlike his predecessor, Ali Mohamed Gedi – a move also opposed by TFG President Abdullah Yusuf. (more…)
Corruption trumps tribalism – New York Times (IHT)
January 10th, 2008
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/10/opinion/10iht-edrough.1.9130273.html
Kenyans were cynical about their political establishment long before the latest election violence. One wisecrack doing the rounds since last year says “there is more chance of a Luo becoming president of the United States than president of this country” – referring to Barack Obama, whose father hails from the same ethnic Luo country in western Kenya as Raila Odinga, challenger to the incumbent, Mwai Kibaki of the Kikuyu tribe.
Nearly 500 people have been killed in the violence following the announcement by Kenya’s electoral commission that Kibaki somehow pulled back from a million-vote deficit to win re-election. This has prompted dire warnings that the country risks a political meltdown along ethnic-tribal lines.
Sea of tin: view of one of Nairobi's slums (Photo: Simon Roughneen)
But there are problems with this analysis. First, while Kenya’s tribal divisions are a proximate cause, they are not the underlying source of the bloodshed. Second, Kenya’s stability has always been tenuous; the current battle lines were drawn at least since Kibaki was soundly defeated by Odinga’s Orange Democratic Movement in a 2005 referendum on the Constitution. (more…)
Kenyan polls spark tribal battles – ISN
January 7th, 2008
Ethnic fires have been stoked by long-running graft and political cronyism, and Kenya’s much-touted stability was always tenuous at best.
By Simon Roughneen
Despite violence in Darfur, Somalia, eastern Congo and the Niger Delta, welcome and belated Africa-optimism was peddled among diplomatic and investment circles throughout 2007.
Continent-wide economic growth and some tentative conflict resolution successes – as well as growing engagement by China, India and Dubai – prompted western analysts to talk up Africa’s prospects, albeit within a monolithic paradigm.
However, just last week, Kenya’s flawed election results and ensuing violence have undermined such optimism given the country’s status as a stable and relatively prosperous one in a troubled region. (more…)
Cynicism and corruption at the root of Kenya’s problems – Sunday Business Post
January 6th, 2008
http://archives.tcm.ie/businesspost/2008/01/06/story29380.asp
It is too simplistic to say that Kenya’s troubles stem from tribal differences, writes Simon Roughneen.
Kenyans were coyly cynical about their political establishment long before the violence following the presidential election last weekend.
Luo and Kikuyu square-off after disputed elections (AFP)election last weekend.
One wisecrack doing the rounds since last year goes ‘‘there is more chance of a Luo becoming president of America than president of this country’’ – a reference to Barack Obama, whose father comes from the same ethnic Luo region in western Kenya as Raila Odinga, the challenger to the incumbent president, Mwai Kibaki, who is from the Kikuyu tribe.
While Kenya is often portrayed as a business-oriented tourist haven in a troubled region, more than 350 people have been killed in the past week since Kenya’s electoral commission announced that Kibaki somehow pulled back a million vote deficit to win the election.
Street violence, church massacres and foiled demonstrations followed, suggesting that Kenya risks political meltdown along ethnic-tribal lines.
After a US diplomatic intervention, Kibaki said yesterday that he is ready to form a government of national unity to end the crisis that followed his disputed election. The president also said he may accept opposition demands for a fresh election, but only by court order. However, o n the streets the fighting continues.
While Kenya’s tribal divisions are a proximate cause, they are not the underlying source of the violence. (more…)
HIV/AIDS: What No Child Should Have – The Irish Catholic
November 2nd, 2006
It kills 8,500 people every day, and with over 40 million people infected worldwide, HIV-AIDS remains a major global
Kids at GOAL Nairobi CCEC playing football (Photo: Simon Roughneen)
health and life issue. While success stories such as Uganda’s ABC programme, stressing abstinence and fidelity, have brought infection rates down from 21% in the late 1980’s to a current level of 4-5%, countries such as Botswana have an infection rate of almost 40% of the adult population.
But HIV-AIDS is not just an adult problem. Children too are vulnerable to a sexually-transmitted disease, a social reality that is as absurd as it is sickening.
Over 2000 children (under -fifteen) are infected with HIV every day. Statistics on total under-eighteen infections are difficult to ascertain
Or, to put it another way, one child dies every minute from HIV-AIDS. Four are infected – every minute. So by the time you read this, depending on how quickly you read, or if you are interested enough to finish, maybe 8-12 children will have been infected with the virus by the end of the article. And 2-3 will be dead.
Just 12 years old, Kennedy is HIV-positive. His eyes fade shyly to the floor at each question, and flick around the room briefly as he answers, without focusing on anything, and quickly direct to the ground again. He is barely audible as he speaks.
Kennedy has been in the GOAL Rescue Centre since December 2004. He misses his two younger sisters – but he does not say very much. He does tell us however, “I like being here. But I want to find a home.”
Florence Gesage, GOAL social worker at the Nairobi rescue centre, takes up the story. (more…)
Hard to believe your eyes: drought in Kenya and Ethiopia – OpenDemocracy
May 15th, 2006
http://www.opendemocracy.net/democracy-africa_democracy/drought_3542.jsp
Driving through northern Kenya’s drought-affected famine district as the midday sun lifts temperatures to over 40 degrees centigrade, pools of water shimmer in the distance, laying between dessicated trees and shrubs, with the mountains of Turkana peering through the haze.
Mirage in Turkana, northern Kenya (Photo: Simon Roughneen)
But these aren’t pools. There is no water here. By a cruel irony, this parched land taunts its thirsty and hungry people with distant images – mirages – of glistening oases in the distance. There hasn’t been rainfall since 2004, according to Akwari Nubukwi, an elder in the village of Kanigipur in the southern Turkana district. “We use the water from the riverbed, where we dig to find it. But it is just a little water, and even the goats and dogs drink from it”, he told me.
The locals who are now suffering without water, whose animals – their main food and livelihood source – are dying, know better to be caught out by the illusion of water. Akwari adds: “Many animals have died. We haven’t had rain for a year. People are losing their animals. We are hungry now.” (more…)
Cattle dying, people next? – HeraldAM
May 2nd, 2006
Leaning on his walking stick, Shamsidin Mohamed flicks his fingers up and down in turn, alternating between whispering and counting out loud in his native Somali.
By the time he has finished, he tots-up 23 cattle dead out of a herd of 70. It is a catastrophic loss. These herders are dependent on their animals for food and income. No agriculture is possible in such a barren, rock-strewn, sun-dried place, more lunar than earthly in appearance.
“This is very dangerous here. Just a little rain, but no pasture for the animals. Most people can’t count the dead animals. We have to move many kilometres every day looking for pasture, water. The animals are weak, they die in the bush, sometimes people don’t know when and where
Emaciated cattle in southern Oromo region in drought-affected Ethiopia, clse to Kenyan border (Simon Roughneen)
The vital winter rains failed across southern Ethiopia, northern Kenya and much of Somalia, leaving Shamsidin and 8 million others in this vast desolate region balancing precariously between subsistence and destitution.
Here, with people utterly dependent on herding animals for food and income, destitution means potential starvation. With their skin stretched taut over protruding ribcages and calvicles, the cattle are emaciated, shuffling along with their heads bowed, as if lacking the strength to see where the herder is taking them. (more…)
“Our Goats are our Gardens” – Evening Herald
March 24th, 2006
LOKICHAR, KENYA – Ekiru Lotiayan walked for two days with his herd of 35 goats just to reach this dried-up river bed near Lokichar in northern Kenya’s Turkana district.
He points to a mountain on the horizon. “That is my home. My family wait there for me to come back”, he tells us.
We have been suffering with the hunger for many years. In Turkana, we have not had proper rains for two years. Our animals are dying. And we are suffering. We need our animals to live. We have no other way.”
6 months previously, this whole area was a freshwater lake. Now locals have dig down into the bed to find water (Photo: Simon Roughneen, northern Kenya, March 2006)
This part of northern Kenya is home to 600,000 people, out of an estimated 11 million people across eastern Africa that are affected by drought and food shortages. 3.5 million of those are in Kenya, east Africa’s wealthiest country. Elsewhere, 2.6 million Ethiopians and 1.7 million Somalis are vulnerable.
The area where north-eastern Kenya, southern Somalia, and Ethiopia share borders is especially badly affected. Lack of infrastructure, remoteness, marginalisation, and insecurity combine to not only undermine local people’s ability to deal with the harsh landscape and arid conditions, but hinder whatever aid effort can be mounted.
Ekiru’s goats scrimmage around a freshly-dug pit in the riverbed. After cutting 7 feet into the surface, the underground water welled up. Now a 10 foot X 7 foot pool of brown stagnant water is lapped-up avidly by the thirsty animals. (more…)
Even Camels Thirst Here – Irish Examiner
March 24th, 2006
On the road between Lodwar and Lokichar in northern Kenya’s Turkana district, we met a woman carrying 15 litres of water in a container balanced on her head.
She got the water she carries from a borehole further along the road. It is shared between around 100 families. And with the water table depleted, the water must be rationed. Moreover, the water she brings will be given to animals as well as her family. It will not go far.
It is an onerous task in any circumstances – but ordinarily Turkana women would not stop to rest while ferrying water even on the 7 mile roundtrip she is making.
Turkana women at Lodwar, northern Kenya, March 2006 (Photo: Simon Roughneen)
It is now evening, and Esther is tired, weakened by months of not having enough food, and as she says;
“We don’t know if we will have enough food, there is not enough water.”
Here, where people’s lives are inextricably bound to their animals, no water means no food.
She adds, “Our animals are dying and they are our food and our livelihood. Without them we are nothing”
With 5 rings around her neck in the Turkana style, Esther is – or was – deemed well-off by local standards. (more…)
Drought, disaster loom – ISN
March 21st, 2006
Simon Roughneen in Turkana, Kenya
The failure of the long rains in late 2005 has left at least 11 million east Africans vulnerable to a severe drought and debilitating food shortages. As animals die due to lack of water and pasture, the people who depend on their livestock for milk, meat, and income are growing hungrier by the day. A region characterised by persistent food insecurity, eastern Africa now faces the real possibility that a famine could devastate its drought-affected areas.
Hunger often affects the young first. Infants are usually most vulnerable to malnutrition (Photo: Simon Roughneen)
Djibouti, Ethiopia, Somalia, and Kenya are the hardest-hit countries, with food insecurity also a problem in Rwanda, Burundi, Eritrea, and Tanzania. Meanwhile, in Sudan and Uganda, over eight million refugees and internally displaced persons (IDPs) languish in camps, dependent on food aid. (more…)
